How Gratitude Influences Well-Being: A Structural Equation Modeling Approach

The main purpose of this study was to examine the relationships among gratitude, social support, coping style, and well-being. In total, 750 undergraduate participants completed four inventories measuring the variables of interest. Analyses of structural equation modeling found that gratitude had direct effects on undergraduates’ active coping styles, social support, and well-being. In addition, gratitude had indirect effects on undergraduates’ well-being via an active coping style and social support, and social support had direct effects on undergraduates’ active coping styles. These results support the proposed model of well-being and contribute to the understanding of how gratitude influences undergraduates’ well-being via interpersonal and cognitive variables.     

Applying a Treatment Effects Model to Investigate Public Amenity Effect on Physical Activity of the Elderly

The increasing elderly population puts significant health, economic, and social burdens on society. Physical activity is one of the most cost-effective ways to maintain the health of the elderly. This study adopts a treatment effects model to investigate the causal relationship between environment attributes and physical activity among the elderly, while taking endogeneity into account. The data were collected from 274 participants by face-to-face interviews in Taichung, Taiwan. Performing physical activity regularly in parks is the most important measure of the amount of physical activity by the elderly. Providing sufficient and accessible parks in metropolitan residential neighborhoods could be one of the most cost-effective ways to promote physical activity for the elderly living in midsize Asian cities.     

The Potential of A College Town As A Retirement Community

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the potential of college towns as retirement communities. The uniqueness of college towns as potential retirement communities are identified and discussed. Differences between college towns and Sunbelt state retirement destinations regarding the factors that are most concerned by retiree migrants in their decision-making for relocation were compared. The results showed no differences between the college towns and the Sunbelt state retirement cities. Only a few differences existed among the college town subgroups. The findings are of value to the senior living industry, local government and chamber of commerce in their efforts in marketing college towns as prospective retirement communities.     

Factors Influencing the Career Decision Status of Chinese American Youths

The purpose of this study was to understand how intergenerational family conflict and relational‐interdependent self‐construal influence the career decision status of Chinese American youths. Participants were 129 Chinese American youths, with ages ranging from 14 to 21 years. Results from regression analysis indicated that high intergenerational family conflict was predictive of career indecision. High relational‐interdependent self‐construal, on the other hand, was predictive of career certainty. Implications for counseling and future research are also discussed.     

Shifting the bell curve: the benefits and costs of raising student achievement

Benefit-cost analysis was conducted to estimate the increase in earnings, increased tax revenues, value of less crime, and reductions in welfare costs attributable to nationwide implementation of rapid assessment, a promising intervention for raising student achievement in math and reading. Results suggest that social benefits would exceed total social costs by a ratio of 28. Fiscal benefits to the federal government would exceed costs to the federal treasury by a ratio of 93. Social benefits would exceed costs to each state treasury by a ratio no lower than 286, and fiscal benefits would exceed costs to each state treasury by a ratio no lower than 5, for all but two state treasuries. Sensitivity analyses suggest that the findings are robust to a 5-fold change in the underlying parameters.     

Associations of the lower urinary tract symptoms with the lifestyle, prostate volume, and metabolic syndrome in the elderly males

This study aimed to evaluate the influence of the lifestyle, prostate volume (PV), and metabolic syndrome (MS) on lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTS) in the elderly males. A total of 764 men aged greater than 40 years were enrolled. Their severities of LUTS were assessed by the International Prostate Symptom Score questionnaire, while their MS was diagnosed according to the criteria developed by the National Cholesterol Education Program Adult Treatment Panel III. Lifestyle factors, PV, and components of MS were compared between no/mild and moderate/severe LUTS groups. In univariate analysis, age, cigarette smoking, alcohol consumption, physical activity, and PV significantly correlated with the severity of LUTS, but the presence or any components of MS did not. Results of multivariate analysis showed that aging, cigarette smoking, lack of regular exercise, and larger PV were independent predictors for moderate/severe LUTS. Notably, the risk factors for LUTS was influenced by the presence of MS. PV may play a role in determining the severity of LUTS for men without MS, while physical activity was the critical factor for men with MS. It was suggested that healthy lifestyle would be beneficial to lessen the severity of LUTS in the elderly males.     

The impact of acculturation identification and acculturative stress on creativity among Iranian immigrants living in Malaysia

The authors investigate how patterns of heritage and mainstream cultural identification and acculturative stress may explain how Iranians living in Malaysia demonstrate enhanced creativity in creative achievements and creative problem-solving. The sample included 328 Iranian students who were recruited using a cluster sampling method. The results reveal that acculturative strategies (biculturalism, bicultural integration, or bicultural marginalisation) are associated with enhanced creativity. Specifically, strategies that involve disengaging from cultural practices, also referred to as marginalisation, are associated with creative achievements and finding creative solutions to problems. Moreover, heritage cultural identification mediated the relationship between culture shock and creative solution. That is, students who experienced culture shock in the mainstream culture relied on their cultural heritage knowledge and showed decline in their ability to solve a problem creatively. The findings illuminate how creative accomplishment and enhanced creativity potential may be linked to acculturation strategies.     

Robustness of the two-sample t-test umdeh violations of the homogeneity of farjance assumptioi

When the two-sample t-test has equal sample slies, it is widely considered to be a robust procedure (with respect to the significaoce level) under violatioa of the assuaptioo of equal variances. This paper is coa-earned with a quantification of the amount of robustness which this procedure has under such violations, The approach is through the concept of "religion of robustness" and the resluts show an extremely strong degree of robustness for the equal an extremely strong degree of robustness for the equal sample size t-test, probably more so than most statistyicians realise. This extremely high level of robustness, however, reduces quickly as the sample sizes begin to vary from equality. The regions of robustnes obtained show that while most users would likely be satisfied with the degree of robustness inherent when the two sample sizes each vary by 10% from equality, most would wish to be much more cautions when the variation is 20%. The study covers sample sizes n₁ -= n ² = 5(5)30(10)50 plus 10% and 20% variations thereof for the two-tailed test and nominal significance levels of 0.01 and 0.05.     

Relationship Level and Customer Response to Service Recovery

Service failure is inevitable. A better understanding of how relationship level (RL) influences a consumer’s response to service failure and recovery is an important topic for academics and practitioners. This study investigates the connections among consumer RL, failure attributions (i.e., stability and controllability), service failure severity, perceived equity (PE), compensation, and consumers’ future behavior in the context of restaurant service and online shopping. Using equity theory, this study explored the importance of consumers’ entire history of shared interactions with service organizations. Specifically, the study empirically tested the different consequences of compensation by manipulating consumer RL. Consumer RL motivates consumers to follow a different attribution process to judge the severity of service failure and determines consumers’ PE. Moreover, consumers’ PE could then influence their future behavioral intentions, especially how they continue the relationship with the service organization. Findings from the two studies indicate that when additional compensation is offered after a service failure, PE increased regardless of consumer RL. The influence of compensation on PE thus varies as a function of RL. Consumers with a low RL are more sensitive to compensation. Furthermore, enhanced equity perception automatically means that corresponding future relationship continuity is also enhanced. The results further demonstrate that controllability attribution influences service failure severity, which has a negative impact on the PE of the exchange and mediates the effectiveness of compensation as a recovery effort.